CHAPTER 6: The Soft Heart
1345 Words
The house felt different in the morning.
Daylight poured through the tall windows, softening the hard edges of the marble and metal. The foyer where blood had stained the floor just hours earlier was spotless—too spotless, as if nothing had ever happened.
If Elena hadn’t seen the intruder fall, she might have believed it.
In the kitchen, Rosa moved with efficient grace, directing staff as they chopped, stirred, and plated. The smell of coffee and garlic fried rice battled with the faint chemical tang of cleaning agents still lingering in the air.
“You did not sleep,” Rosa observed as Elena slid onto one of the stools at the long counter.
“I tried,” Elena said. “My brain refused.”
Rosa poured her a cup of coffee and set it down gently. “You will get used to it.”
“I really hope I don’t,” Elena muttered, wrapping her hands around the mug.
The back door opened. A small whirlwind of limbs and laughter burst in—a boy, maybe seven or eight, with mole-brown hair and wide, anxious eyes. He wore a school uniform, shirt untucked on one side, shoelaces dragging.
“Aunt Rosa!” he called, then skidded to a halt when he saw Elena. “Oh. Sorry. Didn’t know we had visitors.”
Rosa’s stern face softened. “This is Tommaso,” she told Elena. “His father works for the signor. Tommaso, this is the signor’s wife.”
Elena almost choked on her coffee.
“W-wife?” he repeated, eyes going huge. “Like… wife-wife?”
“That is usually what the word means,” Rosa said dryly.
Tommaso looked at Elena with newfound awe. “Wow. You don’t look scary at all.”
She blinked. “Was I supposed to?”
“Well, Papa says Boss is scary,” he said cheerfully, swinging his backpack onto a chair. “So I thought his wife would be scary too. Like a dragon.”
“Tommaso,” Rosa warned.
“What? Dragons are cool,” he protested.
Elena couldn’t help a small laugh. “I’m afraid I don’t breathe fire.”
“So what do you do?” he asked, hopping up onto the stool beside her. “Do you… make the boss eat vegetables? Or remind him about naps?”
“Naps?” Elena repeated, amused.
“Papa says Boss never sleeps,” Tommaso confided, lowering his voice as if sharing secrets about a mythical creature.
“Well, someone has to remind him,” she said. “Maybe we can both try.”
He grinned. It was impossible not to smile back.
“Eat, or you will be late,” Rosa said, placing a plate in front of him. “And you—” she nodded at Elena “—need more than coffee.
Skin will turn to paper.”
Elena opened her mouth to protest, then gave in as a plate appeared in front of her too—garlic rice, eggs, a slice of cured meat, some fruit. Her stomach rumbled traitorously.
By the time she’d taken a few bites, the air shifted.
It wasn’t visible, not exactly. Just an awareness that moved through the room like a change in temperature.
Tommaso straightened instinctively. Rosa looked toward the hall.
Matteo stepped into the kitchen, tie loose, shirt sleeves rolled to his elbows, a faint shadow under his eyes. If he’d slept at all, it didn’t show.
The staff’s chatter dimmed. Not out of fear, Elena realized, but out of habit. His presence demanded attention the way gravity demanded objects.
Then she saw it—the tiny, almost imperceptible softening around his mouth when he spotted Tommaso.
“You’re late,” he said.
Tommaso gulped. “Sorry, Boss.”
“You say that every morning,” Matteo added, walking to the coffee machine.
“I mean it every morning,” the boy said, earnest.
“That’s the problem,” Matteo said, but there was no bite to it.
He poured coffee, then paused.
“Shirt,” he pointed.
Tommaso looked down. “Oh.”
He scrambled to tuck it in properly. His fingers fumbled with the buttons. Elena watched, a familiar ache tugging in her chest—she’d seen the same panic in her students before surprise quizzes.
Without thinking, she reached over. “Here,” she said gently. “You missed a hole. You’ll end up buttoned crooked.”
He froze, cheeks flushing. “Sorry.”
“No need to be sorry,” she said. “Turn around.”
He obeyed. Her fingers worked quickly, fixing the mess of fabric. “There you go,” she said. “Perfect.”
“Thanks,” he said, shy but beaming.
When she looked up, Matteo was watching.
He’d taken a sip of coffee and gone still, mug halfway to his mouth. His eyes were unreadable, but they weren’t cold.
“Tommaso,” he said after a moment. “Your father is on gate duty this morning. I expect you to at least pretend his son knows how to tie his shoes.”
Tommaso glanced at his laces and winced. “Right.”
He slid off the stool and bent to tie them, concentrating hard.
Matteo set his mug down and leaned against the counter.
“You eat,” he told Elena.
“I am eating,” she replied, spearing a piece of egg.
“Good,” he said.
“Boss?” Tommaso straightened again, backpack finally secure. “Will you, um… are you…”
He stammered into silence.
“Spit it out,” Matteo said, but there was an edge of patience there that hadn’t existed when he’d talked to grown men about bullets.
“Are you coming to the match this Sunday?” Tommaso blurted. “Coach said parents… I mean, not parents, but people, can come watch.”
Rosa shot Matteo a look that clearly said if you say no, I will haunt you.
He sighed.
“Yes,” he said. “If nothing explodes, I’ll be there.”
Tommaso’s face lit up. “Really?”
“Don’t make me regret it by missing goals,” Matteo said.
“I’m a defender,” Tommaso reminded him.
“Then don’t let any in.”
“Yes, Boss!”
He grabbed a piece of toast off his plate, stuffed it in his mouth, and ran out the back door, waving at Elena on the way.
“Bye, Mrs. Boss!”
She choked on her coffee.
“Mrs. Boss,” Matteo repeated, lips twitching. “I’ve heard worse titles.”
“He’s sweet,” Elena said, watching the door swing shut. “And anxious.”
“His mother left when he was five,” Rosa said quietly, wiping the counter. “He worries people will go without saying goodbye.”
Elena’s heart squeezed.
She glanced at Matteo. His expression had shuttered again, but she remembered the way he’d come downstairs barefoot at two in the morning, fury and fear hidden in tight control.
“You’re good with him,” she said.
He shrugged. “He’s easy. He only wants two things—someone to show up, and a ball that doesn’t go flat.”
“It’s not easy,” she countered. “Showing up.”
His eyes flicked to her. For a moment, something naked and unguarded flashed there—then it was gone.
“You should eat,” he said again, as if the conversation had never shifted.
She took another bite. The food sat warm in her stomach, easing the cold that had settled there during the night.
Watching him interact with Tommaso, she realized something unsettling.
The man who had signed her into a contract with his name was terrifying.
But the man who answered a boy’s nervous stammer with weary gentleness—who promised to show up at a soccer match between bullet-filled phone calls—wasn’t just terrifying.
He was… human.
And Elena had always been a little too soft when it came to humans who tried despite being broken.
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